Shasta County public health officials and high school athletic leagues will work together to determine when high school sports will start in the North State. 

High school athletic leagues across the North State must submit sanitation plans and protocols on how high schools will protect athletes, coaches and fans from coronavirus. The leagues must then submit their plans to local county health officials for approval. 

Shasta Union High School District Superintendent Jim Cloney says there will be a meeting with members of the Eastern Athletic League to discuss how to move forward. Shasta County’s three biggest high schools — Shasta, Enterprise and Foothill —compete in the EAL, along with Red Bluff High School of Tehama County and Pleasant Valley and Chico of Butte County. 

“I think everyone recognizes the team sports are a very heavy lift and realistically not an option based on guidelines that came out,” Cloney said at the Shasta County Public Health media briefing on Wednesday. “Our primary goal is keeping our schools open. Whether we can keep the schools open and offer extracurriculars like athletics in a limited way all depends on continuous dialogue with our public health officers.” 

Shasta County Public Health Officer Dr. Karen Ramstrom said the state is expected to release its guidelines on how to reopen high school sports this week.

“We will be limited to doing what the state allows,” Ramstrom said. “We can be more restrictive, but we can’t be less (restrictive).” 

On Monday, CIF Northern Section Commissioner Elizabeth Kyle believed the fall sports season could start in mid-October.

In an email, Kyle explained the reasoning for CIF Northern Section following its own reopening plan, rather than follow a schedule released by CIF state, which called for all of California’s 20 sports to host regional and state playoffs from March through June. 

The Northern Section is the only section of the 10 CIF sections that is still planning to have high sports in the fall.

“Fifty of our 68 schools are under 500 enrollment,” Kyle stated via email. “In those schools many students and coaches are two sport or three-sport athletes and coaches. Two seasons of sport did not meet their needs. The Covid numbers at the time were significantly lower in the Northern Section than elsewhere around the state. We wanted to give students and athletes hope that we may be able to return, if the local health departments approved participation.”

Kyle added: “Football in January will be extremely difficult for the mountain schools who often have inclement weather.”

Ethan Hanson started working for the Redding Record Searchlight after four years with the Los Angeles Daily News as a freelancer. His coverage includes working the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament in South Bend, Indiana, and writing about the St. Louis Rams’ move to Los Angeles with the Ventura County Star. He began his career as a play-by-play broadcaster for LA Pierce College from 2011-2017. Follow him on Twitter at @EthanAHanson_RS.